Comments on: Rand Paul Under Attack from the Left for his ‘Lunch Counter Libertarianism’http://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/
Life. Liberty. Property. Defending individual freedom and liberty, one post at a time.Mon, 02 Mar 2015 19:49:00 +0000hourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.1.1By: Brian N.http://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72600
Mon, 24 May 2010 01:39:24 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72600To ‘Libertarians…LOL’, have you read the constitution? It enshrines slavery (3/5 rule) where the previous setup (the articles of Confederation) did not. Re: discrimination: Plessy v. Ferguson was not a policy of inaction.

“Unfortunately, as slaves were not recognized as citizens, a guarantee for the US government to extend rights to them is questionable at best, just as many would now not demand that illegal aliens receive full protection of the law.”

The constitution does not (at least, not as written) extend rights to anyone. It recognizes natural rights prior to any authority claimed and guarantees that the government formed by it will not violate certain of them in certain ways. That the federal government took less time than for the ink to dry to break this promise should come as a surprise to no one but the sort of person who really believes that any country ever worked as described in their high school civics course.

“The fault of the Antebellum version of slavery lies quite squarely with the CAPITALISTS who created it and perpetuated it for centuries. It’d be interesting to see if you would be willing to stand up and place that blame where (in my opinion) it very clearly belongs.”

Capitalism is a phenomenon which, politically, is synonymous with industry. The industrialists were located in the North, the hotbed of abolitionism. Just as ‘the state’ in the modern sense did not exist until the 16th century (Peace of Westphalia) neither did capitalism in the modern sense exist until the 19th century (at least in America) and that ought to be taken into consideration. In any case, why would you only be especially interested in someone’s opinion if it already squarely matched with your own? That’s not a very good way to examine ideas.

Modern America’s attachment to the ideal of equality is so deeply entrenched at this point, most people don’t even recognize it anymore as such, particularly on the left. It’s just a given — it’s the fundamental prism through which everything gets viewed.

Because it’s so entrenched, they fail to see, let alone appreciate, its threat to liberty. It has taken on something of a sacred quality, settled and unquestioned, and so when a Rand Paul comes along to argue a simple principled point — a point that would have been conventional wisdom just a few decades ago — it’s taken as a kind of heresy.

Just look at the assumptions embedded in the Huffington Post piece, for instance, where “curing racism” is taken for granted to be the most important variable in all this. That certain cures might conflict with certain other principles — property and association rights, in this case — is treated dismissively, if even considered at all.

That’s probably one of the biggest frustrations in being a libertarian in 2010 America. We’re constantly battling opponents who are unable or unwilling to argue at the level of first principles, who refuse to step back for a big-picture view, and who thus cannot acknowledge the tradeoffs that come with their embrace of equality as the leading ideal.

]]>By: The Liberty Papers »Blog Archive » Comment of the Day: The ‘Why Politics Sucks’ Editionhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72577
Sat, 22 May 2010 16:37:12 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72577[…] VRB: DD, To whom are you speaking, the ones who benefited from the affirmative action of Jim Crow. […]
]]>By: VRBhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72574
Sat, 22 May 2010 10:59:35 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72574DD,
To whom are you speaking, the ones who benefited from the affirmative action of Jim Crow.
]]>By: Dedicated_Dadhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72568
Sat, 22 May 2010 06:25:34 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72568PS:

Oh, and “Count your blessings!!

DD

]]>By: Dedicated_Dadhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72567
Sat, 22 May 2010 06:23:36 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72567“…Immigrant groups and others start shops and communities of their own and never visit the other ones. No intervention is going to stop the human tendency to find a like-minded community, engage in that community and close off from others.
Comment by Michael O. Powell — May 21, 2010 @ 3:09 am ”

It’s human nature, and perfectly acceptable — so long as it isn’t white-folks doing it.

Put another way “some animals are more equal than others.”

IMHO, it’s long past time to put all of it behind us. Our Republic has done some disgusting things in its history – no right-minded person could argue otherwise – but we’re still infinitely better than the rest of the world.

Spend a few days in the African nation of your choice, then tell me again how much you suffer because of what was done to your ancestors!

FACT: Anyone living here today who is descended from slaves is infinitely better off than the descendants of those who escaped the slave-raiders and hence lives THERE.

To acknowledge that a past wrong benefits descendants in the present does not in any way lessen the horrific nature of the wrong.

I’m not excusing or justifying it, I’m saying “GET OVER IT.”

DD

]]>By: VRBhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72555
Fri, 21 May 2010 12:55:07 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72555“If government is supposed to be our moral compass, why then are we surprised when private actors do such things as segregate lunch counters when government has already said such a practice is acceptable? ”

It is quite evident you have not lived in a population of racist. It isn’t unimaginable to me, that segregation would exist without the law backing it up. In fact there were no law enforcing segregation for almost 20 years after slavery ended. It also blatantly existed after the Civil Rights Act.

The Jim Crow laws were local and it was the Supreme Court that said they were acceptable and constitutional.

You also act as if we do not have representative government and many whom were discriminated against had no vote. So those that thought genocide, slavery and segregation were morally right, were the ones that had the power and their supporters had no qualms.

The government wasn’t bestowed on us, by some omnipotent entity.

]]>By: Michael O. Powellhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72553
Fri, 21 May 2010 11:09:35 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72553“There is just so much wrong with that paragraph I don’t know where to begin but the basic point I think Mr. Berliner is trying to make is that its government rather than entrepreneurs that makes America great.”

I have to gripe here, Stephen. That is quite obviously not what Jake Berliner said at all. He was making the point that both the government and the private sector together share a hybrid form that helps one another. This is broadly agreed upon from most boardrooms to dinner tables to think tanks, aside from the Mises Institute. There is a problem of corruption inherent in that, just as there is a problem of allowing abuse by business communities to run rampant in pursuit of a laissez faire ideological utopia.

Because public-private partnerships can lead to corruption doesn’t mean that it’s unavoidable. European television channels and Canadian ferries are some of the most impressive operations I’ve ever seen, because they’re publicly funded and effectively monetized, whereas the ferries and TV stations of North America are unrideable and unwatchable.

To borrow a quote from George Orwell, political speech is essentially the process of rationalizing the immoral. That’s exactly what Paul is doing here. Libertarianism is as fallable as any other ideology, and a business owner (especially groups of business owners, along with their elected advocates) is just as capable of abusing people and destroying lives as anyone in government.

On segregation, however, I want to make a point that will put me in a totally different camp from my previous statement. It’s important to remember that most ethnic and religious groups in this country SELF-segregate, even if they don’t realize it. A trip to some of the most progressive cities in America, like Seattle or San Francisco, will bear this out. Immigrant groups and others start shops and communities of their own and never visit the other ones. No intervention is going to stop the human tendency to find a like-minded community, engage in that community and close off from others.

]]>By: Controlphreakhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72549
Fri, 21 May 2010 06:32:28 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72549^Even that won’t be a guarantee. You should probably know how to both do something and also not be a complete asshole before TSHFT also.
]]>By: Controlphreakhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72548
Fri, 21 May 2010 06:30:45 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72548I see it as this- the federal and most state governments as we know them today will disappear as we knew them in the past once reality finally hits. You should probably know how to do something. The end.
]]>By: Libertarians .... LOLhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72547
Fri, 21 May 2010 05:27:42 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72547To the above…

I think the suggestion that “the free market” could eradicate attempts at segregation amount to wishful thinking.

I’ve witnessed shopkeepers get wide exposure while making racially derogatory comments, and subsequently have watched their businesses continue to prosper. Personally … if I had to speculate based on what I’ve seen, I’d say that a rebirth of segregation would flourish in large parts of the US if the government ended its efforts as a guarantor of justice on this front. To me, the idea that we could maintain today’s opportunities through the force of market mechanisms alone seems unrealistic given the prevalence of communities that reinforce intolerance.

]]>By: Black Romulanhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72543
Fri, 21 May 2010 04:32:45 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72543Control, thank you for explaining this issue in concrete terms like living wages and media exposure. Often I see groups wanting to apply esoteric dogma on real-world situations, but in this case your explaination cuts to the quick of hundreds of years of racial iniquity simply by explaining that the post-industrial models are changing. Of course there is nothing stopping the average consumer from acting in their own racial best interest, as it had been back in the 1950s and 60s, and since the modern consumer would never tolerate such injustice with their dollars we can be certain that government’s role in protecting certain groups is wholly overstated. Maybe a better way to ensure general access to goods and services is not to guarentee such with governmental protection but to leave social justice actions to private organizations endowed by private donations so the libertarian-minded don’t even have to support such with taxes at all. We can trust modern individuals to act in the best interests of all citizens, so truly the libertarian model should apply here seeing as though otherwise all things in this country are pretty much equal across the board and nothing else controls these issues of racial inquity and bias in our country. Thanks for the clarity.
]]>By: Libertarians .... LOLhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72542
Fri, 21 May 2010 04:28:19 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72542@Controlphreak

Your question is an excellent one. When *most* people talk of “capitalism” they are implicitly referring to a system of markets that is subject to regulations designed to proactively curb abuses.

Here though, I’m referring to the capitalism espoused by Ron Paul, which I think (justifiably) is the same idea of capitalism that Rand Paul would defend … indeed, the same idea of capitalism that Rand Paul already has defended.

This is the idea of unfettered capitalism … where, as Rand Paul says, businesses of the South should have been free to continue denying quality medicine, education, and other practical needs of life to minorities. Even worse, in this extremist form of capitalism, it is also abhorrent for the government to provide these services.

To be clear, I do speculate that Rand Paul’s philosophy would allow him to happily support anti-slavery laws, however that’s a bit separate from my declaration that the Atlantic slave trade is still obviously the product of profit-seekers with an “every man for himself” attitude.

]]>By: Controlphreakhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72541
Fri, 21 May 2010 04:08:33 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72541Really the entire hoopla about Rand is overdone. If he represents a severe reduction in Government’s role in our daily live, that is going to be accomplished no matter who gets elected. And kind of shortly! Yeah, the money is nowhere hahahaha.
]]>By: Controlphreakhttp://www.thelibertypapers.org/2010/05/20/rand-paul-under-attack-from-the-left-for-his-%e2%80%98lunch-counter-libertarianism%e2%80%99/#comment-72540
Fri, 21 May 2010 04:04:35 +0000http://www.thelibertypapers.org/?p=7858#comment-72540As long as the guy slashes the government role by leaps and bounds he’s a success.

Regardless, economically we are entering Phase 2 of the new depression so it doesn’t matter who cuts the micromanaging, but no one better than he. We talk as though there is so much philosophy to sort out here, but unfortunately real austerity is about to cut a whole lot of conversation that used to be thought of as vital quaint status once agencies stop being funded.